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List of 50 new apps that can help you shoot better smartphone photos or catalog your bottle-cap collection. You may have dozens of apps on your phone and scores of websites bookmarked on your laptop, but that doesn't mean you have all the latest tech tools at your fingertips. New mobile apps, services, social networks and other digital tools pop up so frequently that keeping up with them is a nearly impossible task. Just when you think you're up to date, something newer and hipper comes along.

Social networking is bad for society -not a new argument but one that is becoming louder. Social networking is neutral, it is a tool, it can be used for good or bad. We are just beginning to understand it. The most popular social network is Facebook -this proves to me that social networking is not fully understood yet. We need to find ways to present a venue for real discussion. Facebook is nice for connecting with old friend, but hardly a good place for a deep conversation. This is key, using the tools available to create the right platform and venue for creating positive outcomes.

Facebook has been making an effort to attract journalists through its subscribe feature. Apparently it has had some considerable degree of success. Those using the tool have reportedly seen an average increase of 320% since it was launched in November. Naysayers suggest this increase is more to do with quantity than quality and Twitter remains a better tool for journalists. Elsewhere, funnily enough, teenagers seem to be saying something fairly similar. Conversation is better on Twitter. The Next Web describes how some journalists are complaining that they are collecting thousands of followers through their Facebook "Subscribe" buttons who appear to have no interest in their work. These new subscribers, they say, leave comments that are irrelevant, "spammy" or even obscene.

What questions do people type into a search engine? This tool will tell you. Great for content brainstorming.

America is obsessed with its social media tools - more than half of all Americans have a social networking profile. But what does social media tell us about American society? Is our use of social tools a reflection of our interests and behaviors?

UNSOCIAL addresses a key need for more advanced networking tools to drive real-time relationships for business. Through its location-based networking and smart-tagging platform, UNSOCIAL connects users with business professionals they should meet based on shared information and proximity, making it the ideal tool to find and be found at business events, tradeshows and conferences. In the rapidly growing tech arena of mobile, location-based services and events marketing.

Why are social networks powerful tools for causes and campaigns? Many times, people begin to engage in activism only after they've been attracted by the fun stuff in a campaign - connecting with old friends and sharing photos, for example. When they witness others participating, they'll be more likely to join the cause. With socializing as the primary draw, it's become easier for organizers to attract more and more unlikely activists through social media.

"With mobile banking systems on the rise, health experts are hoping to capitalize on the budding technology to make health services more accessible as well. The mobile finance systems allow subscribers to store and transfer money as credits on their phones, and withdraw cash from local vendors when needed. The tools have appealed to many people who previously had no banking mechanism."

Some great points on social media from the New Zealand State Services Commission wiki. Make it findable. Search is good, but tangible evidence that the discussion is happening is better. 'Most viewed' or 'latest discussions' are simple ways of showing that evidence, and are based on how people click their way through your site. Make it navigable. Create linkages between related contributions, so that one contribution leads to another, which leads to another, and so on. This breaks down isolation between participants, gives them a sense of discovery and encourages them to respond to new things they've found. Tagging and tag clouds are one great way of making user-generated content navigable, by helping people see connections between their ideas and the ideas of others. Make it portable. Prompt people to bring the discussion into their own context -- at home, at work, or on other sites. This will draw in more people to the discussion and help everyone feel connected to what's happening on their own terms. APIs, widgets and gadgets are key tools for doing this. Make it personable. It's important to know that there is a someone -- not a something -- behind the ideas. Social media, like blogs, are compelling because they have personality and a sense of authenticity behind them. Seek ways for people to add personality to their contributions.

Social media may be all the rage for building brands and connecting with customers, but what some entrepreneurs might not know is that many companies are using social networks for internal communication as well. These tools can help business owners align corporate goals, drive employee engagement and streamline operations.

Awesome new keyword tool! That is, if the data is accurate.

This article backs up the fact that "digital literacy" means much more than just knowing how to using digital tools. Discernment and judgment are also skills necessary in becoming digitally literate. To survive online you need to identify curators (as the author points out), get in the habit of crosschecking information, and learn now to minimize distractions.

I guess Wave didn't die after all :) I hope the new features in Google Apps take people (the ones I work with at least) away from email as their primary project management and collaboration tool. It's worth a shot.

My new use of social media is to create new things and to find others creating in similar ways. I want to know who is using the tools to build real communities, support causes, heal hurt, collaborate to make something bigger than what each of us can build alone.

The Organic Farmer radio shows in Kenya use mobile and radio technology as a platform for collaboration and sharing farming information in local communities. "The Organic Farmer shows the value of using SMS and radio together. While text messaging offers a method of interaction with listeners, John says, "We can't rely on SMS alone, since we can't send a whole paragraph, only the basic information." Radio provides a platform to explore topics in depth, but John suggests, "Radio is not a stand-alone medium - radio must be supported by other tools. SMS allows us to do that.""

Things are changing so rapidly that the way we think of social media could be vastly different in the very near future. In the next three years alone spending on social media marketing will skyrocket in the B2B space from $11 million in 2009 to $54 million by 2014, according to a Forrester Research study. With new tools like Gowalla and Shopkick shaping how brands and consumers interact, marketers are recognizing how positioning themselves as industry thought leaders can help generate quality leads.

When Toronto law firm Hicks Morley started its own internal social network in 2008, it was mainly to relieve lawyers of email overload so they could find important information more efficiently. But the firm found that by adopting several tools that mimic Facebook, Wikipedia and Twitter within the confines of a corporate firewall, collaboration between employees increased dramatically, and there was a marked increase in employee productivity.

 Pwnedlist.com tells you if your user name or email address has been revealed in one of the recent hacker attacks on, for instance, Gawker or Sony's gaming division. It is worth knowing, especially if you use the same details to log into a variety of sites. All you have to do is type in your email address or user name into the box on Pwnedlist.com and it will tell you if it has appeared in any of lists of data that have been dumped onto the Internet recently.

Free utility that turns a windows 7 laptop into a wireless hotspot.

Could be very useful for workshops with limited number of cables.

Need to use Mind Mapping software but don't have an extra $400 laying around for MindJet? Here's an alternative, there's a free version which you may outgrow quickly, but the paid versions are reasonably priced.